How Will the Chinese Milk Crisis Impact Supplement and Ingredient Firms? NBJ Investigates

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is preparing to open its first office in China this week in response to the barrage of food and product safety scares that have originated in the country over the last several years.

Nov 18, 2008

The office will be located in Beijing and represents the FDA’s first office outside of the United States. It will be followed by the opening of two additional Chinese offices later this month and of an India office next month. The FDA has also stepped up its import controls for dairy products from China and has broadened its investigation into non-dairy protein products coming from the country.

There has been a history of contaminated ingredients and product adulteration from Chinese manufactures. However, the largest Chinese food safety scandal broke in September, when it was learned that milk and infant formula adulterated with poisonous melamine had led to more than 54,000 hospitalizations and four child deaths. Since then, 22 Chinese and 10 global manufactures have been linked to the contaminated dairy products, leading to increased governmental and business scrutiny over the entire international supply chain.

In our upcoming Raw Material & Ingredient Supply issue, which will publish in December, Nutrition Business Journal provides a chronological breakdown and explanation of how the most recent melamine contamination occurred, a retrospective analysis of the history of supplement adulteration in China, and a look into the long-term impact these issues will have on the global ingredients market.